I am writing to correct erroneous statements contained in last week’s letters section, which criticized me for allegedly “mocking” another Arizona House of Representatives member for her floor invocation. I did not mock her and what she said was not the opening prayer that she had volunteered to lead.

As background, at the start of each session individual members volunteer to “lead” the daily opening “prayer” on the House floor. The incident in question involved a reportedly atheist member leading prayer with a secular statement that was the opposite of a prayer. A prayer is “an address (such as a petition) to God or a God in word or thought,” according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. This member’s secular, non-prayer attributed the creation of the universe to nature, which is a denial of God.

Now I have no problem with a member reading such a statement as his or her own thought, but in this case the member volunteered to lead the chamber in prayer. Consequently, all who stood with her, the entire chamber, were accepting her words as their words of prayer. The member was speaking for them as their prayer leader. Only at the end was it apparent that the atheist member had put ungodly words into the mouths of all present. That was wrong and offensive.

However, because I did not believe the member intended to insult anyone, I did not rise-up to criticize her. However, I used the “Introduction of Guests” part of the day’s opening to lightheartedly introduce “God” as my guest that day and I identified God as the same God who created nature, that same nature that the atheist member credited with the creation of all things.

Thus, without malice or criticism, I placed God back into what was supposed to be the opening.